Jim Lovell Before A Centrifuge Run, November 1964

Neil Armstrong, 1964 

Jim Lovell & Frank Borman in TO THE MOON

Jim Lovell: “Just to be confined in there like a sardine in a can, that was a real trial. And, of course, you’re sitting right next to your companion, and for two weeks, being with Frank Borman… Two weeks being with Frank Borman any place was a real challenge. *laughs*”

Lovell: “Frank had a book called ‘Roughing it’ which we tried to read. We also sang to each other.”

Frank Borman: “Nat King Cole, at that time, had a very popular song: ‘Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone’.”

Lovell: “*singing* Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone, let’s pretend that you and I are all alone.”

Borman: “That got on our minds and we sang that damn song for two weeks. *laughs*”

Lovell, laughing: “We still sing it, occasionally.”

I was watching that video where a group of astronauts answer the most commonly googled questions about space and this was one of the top comments

Like

I have

No idea

What they’re

Talking about

Gus inspecting a Mercury capsule, photographed by Bill Taub, circa 1961

you had me at the first line

*Tom Stafford in here*

And finally my love, smiley John Watts Young

“Astronaut Edward White studies moments of inertia on a reference model at the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston, Texas.”

(credit to the owners)

Happy Birthday to Neil Armstrong on what would have been his 90th birthday.

“All his life, in whatever he did, Neil personified the essential qualities and core values of a superlative human being: commitment, dedication, dependability, a thirst for knowledge, self-confidence, toughness, decisiveness, honesty, innovation, loyalty, positive attitude, self-respect, respect for others, integrity, self-reliance, prudence, judiciousness, and much more. No member of the human race stepping out onto another heavenly body could possibly have represented the best of humanity more than Neil Armstrong did.” - James Hansen in First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong

Bringing in the weekend with the boys hanging around.